Texas, where science and history have become ideological battlegrounds

PBS will show the story of the Texas State School Board's assault on facts.

The Texas state capital building in Austin, where some of the action takes place.

Scott Thurman

Some of the most important decisions that influence the public's knowledge aren't made by scientific societies and they don't take place in Washington DC. For the most part, they're made in the capitals of each state, as each has its own standards for what students leaving its public schools should know. Those standards set lesson plans and help decide which textbooks are acceptable.

That latter feature means that states with large student populations, like Texas and California, have an outsized influence on education in other states, as textbook publishers work hard to ensure that their products can sell in the largest markets possible. So the state school board in Texas, an elected body that approves education standards once a decade, can have a widespread impact on the US education system.

Unfortunately, the schoolboard in Texas has been a mess. Elections with tiny voter turnouts have put in place religious and ideological warriors who want to rewrite textbooks in the image of their own beliefs, disregarding the expertise of the people who actually know the subject areas at issue. Their contentious assault on science and history standards, which took place in 2010, has been captured in the film The Revisionaries, which PBS' Independent Lens will be showing this coming week.

The process for creating Texas' educational standards is mostly a sound one. A panel of educators and subject experts, often drawn from the academic community, decided which subjects are most relevant and what students should know about them. The standards are then handed over to the board for approval. But the soundness ends there. The board, which may not (and in many cases, does not) have expertise in these subject areas, is allowed to delete, edit, or replace any of the standards recommended by the experts.

And oh boy, do some of them relish the chance. You can see how much respect then-Board Chairman Don McLeroy has for expertise in the clip below, where he wonders why none of them support his tortured misrepresentation of Stephen J. Gould.

Don McLeroy pleads with his fellow board members to join him in fighting the experts.

McLeroy, a young-Earth creationist who thinks the world is 6,000 years old, is one of the center points of The Revisionaries, which opens with him being grilled in the state capital. He was nominated by Texas governor Rick Perry for another term as Chair at a time when, as one of his questioners notes, there were 11 bills under consideration to strip him of his existing powers. Yet somehow, he came within two votes of being approved.

The movie follows the testimony and actions of the board as it tears through—and in some cases, tears up—the science and history standards that were forwarded to them. It uses footage of hearings and votes, along with interviews of many of the participants, including a professor involved in writing the science standards, and Kathy Miller of the Texas Freedom Network, an organization dedicated to limiting the impact of the board's more ideological members.

And they are seriously ideological. McLeroy is quoted as saying, "education is too important to not be politicized," while fellow board member Cynthia Dunbar claims that "education is inherently religious." And she apparently treats the board meetings the same way, as she's shown giving an opening prayer in which she calls for Jesus to help everyone recognize that the US is "a Christian land, governed by Christian principles."

The existing Texas science standards had language that called for the "strengths and weaknesses" of evolution to be taught. That language has opened the door to the sorts of spurious criticisms that McLeroy is fond of (and apparently, subjects some of his dental patients to). So when the proposed new standards came to the board without any mention of strengths and weaknesses, McLeroy and others fought hard to put them back in. As a compromise, the board simply renamed them to "analyze and evaluate," creating awkward results like instructing students to "analyze all sides of scientific information" about evolution.

If anything, the history standards were worse. Dunbar claims she's a "big fan" of Thomas Jefferson, but thinks a "secular humanistic ideology" has clouded current interpretations of his work. So she cuts him out of the standards on the Enlightenment and its influence on the US' founding documents, instead substituting in pre-enlightenment figures like Thomas Aquinas and John Calvin. Further revisions to history come rapid fire, as others try to add the Heritage Foundation, Moral Majority, and NRA to a section on the '80s, and another person tries to make sure Barack Obama's middle name (Hussein) is added to the text where his name appears.

One board member, looking at the results, is seen saying, "I feel that I have let down the students in our state because all those kids in our schools right now, when they get to college, they're going to learn the real history."

The movie ends with McLeroy losing his reelection bid by a few hundred votes, but already thinking about running again at his next opportunity. But some of his many opponents note that the changes he helped make to the standards will be influencing entire generations of students before they're next revised in 2020.

Enough people describe the whole process as a mess that it's no surprise The Revisionaries struggles to lay it out in a narrative. The challenge is made larger by the filmmakers' decision to provide little framing for the footage, other than sporadic notes scratched on a blackboard to give some sense of the timing and location of the clips. As a result, the movie really doesn't work if you go into it hoping to get a history of the Texas school board. In fact, it would probably be better if you went in to things with a rough outline of the events (the one in this review would be enough).

But if you've got that, the film is a fascinating glimpse into the sorts of thinking that drive the public controversies that have happened in Texas and elsewhere. The issue is probably best captured by some footage of McLeroy away from his work on the school board, teaching a Sunday School class at his church. In tackling Noah's Ark, he only spends a brief moment on the moral import of the story, and then he's off with a scale model of the ark, discussing how its interior could have been organized. Before the scene ends, the children are out on a soccer field, laying out the shape of the ark and counting out known species of animals, all in an effort to show it could work.

For some people, it's not enough to have beliefs. The facts have to be made to comport with them, and everybody else then has to agree with those facts.

The Revisionaries will be appearing on PBS' "Independent Lens" this week. You can find out more details at the PBS site.

We have a body of knowledge that was obtained through the scientific method. That knowledge is used to create the things that make what we know as modern society. You can either teach students that body of knowledge or you can *waste time* debating ideas that have been demonstrated to be inferior or outright wrong. There is too much science that students need to know to be wasting time.

As a US citizen - I would prefer our students be given every opportunity and advantage available.

Thank you for admitting you have only taken a little look at the evidence for creation science. To what rigorous testing for evolution do you refer? How can you scientifically test something that supposedly happened billions of years ago?

MODERATION: The "Thank you for admitting" language is trolling. Either address their arguments, stop posting, or you'll get a ban with your next offense.

I disagree with the author here and the threat of banning. The language came across as polite and not at all trolling in my opinion. The alleged troller has a point with respect to being able to test past evolution by repeated experiment. it can't be done. So evidence of evolution depends on what we can find recorded in nature. Fortunately there is plenty of that kind of evidence.

Not true. Evolutionary "progress" was demonstrated and studied in real time in an experiment involving e. coli, citric acid, and a few decades of lab work. This is a famous experiment - all should know about it by now.

I'm a new reader who recently moved from reading Slashdot to Ars over the past few months. Ars seems to have higher quality articles with more relevance, better graphical presentation, and more rational discussions in their comments section. However, one of the main reasons I moved from Slashdot to Ars was because of the vehement animosity the Slashdot community had towards people of my faith (Christianity). I was hoping to find a more accepting reader base here at Ars, but I see from many of the posts here in the discussions that that might not be the case.

Look, Christians and Atheists are going to fundamentally disagree on some major pieces of our worldviews. That's not new, and nastily stereotyping the people who subscribe to one belief or another is never going help us communicate. For what it's worth, I place a high value on science and scientific principles. I'm not 'stupid' and 'ignorant' as many posts seem to suggest. I have a graduate degree from Carnegie Mellon in the information systems field which has afforded me a great career in performing research. I may disagree with a few theories that have come out of the scientific community, but I don't view religion and science as mutually exclusive by any means. I also know that no matter how much I may believe something to be true, I can't force it upon others who may see differently. I hope Ars uses its great website to celebrate our common interests rather than divide us by our differences as so many other forums have.

Side note: I recognize that there are many, many Christians who are equally guilty for breaking down communications with the Atheistic scientific community. I don't mean to accuse one side without acknowledging the faults of the other.

It's also worth noting that you don't win against these people using anger to mobilize those who agree with you, or using shame. These people can't be shamed, and voting/protesting the Revisionists out of office will not fix the underlying problem of a misinformed public.

If you want to win the war against ignorance, you do it by educating the stupid, not yelling at them for being stupid.

But that's the heart of the problem when those selfsame people hijack the education system

Part of the problem with state education standards comes from the fact that they exist at all. The wider the scope, the higher the stakes, and the more motivation for people to try to set them.

The most motivated people tend to be kooks, whichever side of an issue. The pro-evolution people who get onto these boards tend to be evangelical atheists, which motivates the fundamentalist Christian kooks even more.

Science is based on fact and is the closest we will ever get to "absolute truth", religion in most cases is based on "God said" with no real facts behind the details and in many cases is adjusted to fit in with preexisting ones. Teaching religion (especially as an "alternative" to science) is a complete waste of resources for public schools, if they want to learn about there are other ways to do so.

However, the biggest thing against going with both is that soon almost every religion will form their own "science" and demand that it also be tough in school making it so that students will come out woefully under educated when it comes to science since they won't have the resources to cover all of those "sciences" to the same degree that real science is today. And then we have the "risk" of it spilling over into other areas of science stretching the resources even more thinly compared to what they actually get taught that would be useful in the outside world.

she's shown giving an opening prayer in which she calls for Jesus to help everyone recognize that the US is "a Christian land, governed by Christian principles."

When I hear people like this speak I want to open death camps again.

The US was NOT founded by christians nor is it a "christian land." Just because you have the freedom to practice a religion doesn't mean the country was founded on it. Many of the founding fathers despised religion. Once again, the christian mentality is to focus on one point while ignoring the insurmountable evidence that proves it wrong.

Prayer? Do you really think a magic man will answers your "wishes" like Santa while ignoring truly impoverished people in the rest of the world? Have you ever READ the bible? It takes a 5th grade mentality to realize it was written by man.

Right, twice, in 4 words and a prefix. Ask a religious person for 4 words of equally potent meaning, all you get is "So sayeth the Lord", or "The end is nigh!". Ask for 5 and you get the same thing prefixed by "OMG!"

The most motivated people tend to be kooks, whichever side of an issue. The pro-evolution people who get onto these boards tend to be evangelical atheists, which motivates the fundamentalist Christian kooks even more.

We have several documented instances (this story is just one) of the religious trying to foist their belief system on children through the public education system. Do you have a reference for your alleged atheist "kook"?

Right, twice, in 4 words and a prefix. Ask a religious person for 4 words of equally potent meaning, all you get is "So sayeth the Lord", or "The end is nigh!". Ask for 5 and you get the same thing prefixed by "OMG!"

The idea that science has nothing to say about religion is an error whenever religion makes testable claims about reality.

That latter feature means that states with large student populations, like Texas and California, have an outsized influence on education in other states, as textbook publishers work hard to ensure that their products can sell in the largest markets possible.

With the lower cost and flexibility of eBooks one particular market shouldn't influence as much.

Alot of it is not the physical cost of printing the books but the actual cost of creating and editing them. An ebook is not going to help that at all, in fact having multiple versions will just increase costs.

The vast majority of the cost in creating a book, any book, is in everything except the physicality. Between 80-90% of a typical books cost is in writing, editing, marketing, etc. The balance is even worse for books that require a large number of subject matter experts, such as textbooks, as SME's do not come cheap and often you need dozens or even hundreds of them, depending on the topic.

How much cost to create a book?

Depends on the book of course, but as I said above, the production costs of a book are only 10-20% the physical portion. The rest is creative costs. This has been covered extensively on web sites run by authors and publishers, and I even did the experiment myself pretending I was going the complete self publishing route and laying out the costs to me assuming low numbers and worst case shipping(its in my post history about a year ago).

Book content is expensive. Physicality is cheap.

Agreed. This is wht the Amazon ebook issue of them selling below wholesale cost is an issue. The continue to arguwe the price is simply unreasonable for material that's free to copy infinitely, but the reality is, each copy has a royalty, a BIG one, paid to editors, authors, and others, plus marketingand more. The cost of printing and shipping is 10-15% of the common hardcover. Anohter 40% is retail overhead (so the seller can make a profit). Take 55-60% off the MSRP, that's the "cost" of the book, which includes about 10-20% profit for the publishing company itself and the rest is all royalties. That $39.99 copy of the latest Game of Thrones has a cost of somewhere about $18, NOT including printing costs. The publisher sells it to Amazon for that, and if Amazon is selling eboojks for $10, they're losing $8 a copy, which makes it impossible for anyone else to match that price. Selling it that low also undervalues print publishing, forcing stores to cut HEAVILY into their own 40% profits (much of which is operating costs) to compete. This is why so many book stores are closed and going bankrupt, and why so few ebook stores exist online. Eventually, so many book stores will be closed that amazon will have an eventual monopoly on most book sales both print and e-versions, and then they'll stop discounting them below wholesale. Publisher's fought back with the agency model, allowing them to set their own street prices individually (instead of the reseller setting them), a process that is perfectly LEGAL and used commonly in all forms of retail today, and Amazon sued them, and somehow WON?

I'm a new reader who recently moved from reading Slashdot to Ars over the past few months. Ars seems to have higher quality articles with more relevance, better graphical presentation, and more rational discussions in their comments section. However, one of the main reasons I moved from Slashdot to Ars was because of the vehement animosity the Slashdot community had towards people of my faith (Christianity). I was hoping to find a more accepting reader base here at Ars, but I see from many of the posts here in the discussions that that might not be the case.

Look, Christians and Atheists are going to fundamentally disagree on some major pieces of our worldviews. That's not new, and nastily stereotyping the people who subscribe to one belief or another is never going help us communicate. For what it's worth, I place a high value on science and scientific principles. I'm not 'stupid' and 'ignorant' as many posts seem to suggest. I have a graduate degree from Carnegie Mellon in the information systems field which has afforded me a great career in performing research. I may disagree with a few theories that have come out of the scientific community, but I don't view religion and science as mutually exclusive by any means. I also know that no matter how much I may believe something to be true, I can't force it upon others who may see differently. I hope Ars uses its great website to celebrate our common interests rather than divide us by our differences as so many other forums have.

Side note: I recognize that there are many, many Christians who are equally guilty for breaking down communications with the Atheistic scientific community. I don't mean to accuse one side without acknowledging the faults of the other.

You'll find many posters here who support you in your faith. I'm not one of them so you may wish to put me on your "ignore" list now.

I'm a new reader who recently moved from reading Slashdot to Ars over the past few months.

I've read your treatise, but I don't know how you feel about the article you're responding to. You've been presented with a specific situation in which religion and science are, in fact, mutually exclusive.

Right, twice, in 4 words and a prefix. Ask a religious person for 4 words of equally potent meaning, all you get is "So sayeth the Lord", or "The end is nigh!". Ask for 5 and you get the same thing prefixed by "OMG!"

The idea that science has nothing to say about religion is an error whenever religion makes testable claims about reality.

The point is that at that time you have left the area of religion, so are no longer really talking about religion. Or shouldn’t be.

Ergo, the error is in the person(s) not in the idea.

EDIT: Which really gets down to the bass tacks about the fundamental property of the Judaism/Christianity/Islam that makes them poor matches for modern society. They are constructed in such a way that makes them inherently plants themselves over that line, thus are a poor religious base to build from the [religion of the] future.

Right, twice, in 4 words and a prefix. Ask a religious person for 4 words of equally potent meaning, all you get is "So sayeth the Lord", or "The end is nigh!". Ask for 5 and you get the same thing prefixed by "OMG!"

The idea that science has nothing to say about religion is an error whenever religion makes testable claims about reality.

The point is that at that time you have left the are of religion, so are no longer really talking about religion. Or shouldn’t be.

Ergo, the error is in the person(s) not in the idea.

I disagree. It may be the case that many religious believers don't think their God has a direct impact on the observable universe but that's a deist's position. Theism, on the other hand, invokes a God that answers prayer (as just one example). All three Abrahamic religions make claims about their God that are clearly within the realm of observation.

edit: Thanks for the clarification. I'm afraid I'd already written my response. Can you write to the purpose of a religion that has no observable features?

The most motivated people tend to be kooks, whichever side of an issue. The pro-evolution people who get onto these boards tend to be evangelical atheists, which motivates the fundamentalist Christian kooks even more.

We have several documented instances (this story is just one) of the religious trying to foist their belief system on children through the public education system. Do you have a reference for your alleged atheist "kook"?

I would say the various lawsuits by atheists to remove biblical quotations from public buildings might qualify. One doesn't have to believe in God to appreciate the history involved. Why is the display of the Ten Commandments on a courthouse an unconstitutional establishment of religeon?

I'm a new reader who recently moved from reading Slashdot to Ars over the past few months. Ars seems to have higher quality articles with more relevance, better graphical presentation, and more rational discussions in their comments section. However, one of the main reasons I moved from Slashdot to Ars was because of the vehement animosity the Slashdot community had towards people of my faith (Christianity). I was hoping to find a more accepting reader base here at Ars, but I see from many of the posts here in the discussions that that might not be the case.

Look, Christians and Atheists are going to fundamentally disagree on some major pieces of our worldviews. That's not new, and nastily stereotyping the people who subscribe to one belief or another is never going help us communicate. For what it's worth, I place a high value on science and scientific principles. I'm not 'stupid' and 'ignorant' as many posts seem to suggest. I have a graduate degree from Carnegie Mellon in the information systems field which has afforded me a great career in performing research. I may disagree with a few theories that have come out of the scientific community, but I don't view religion and science as mutually exclusive by any means. I also know that no matter how much I may believe something to be true, I can't force it upon others who may see differently. I hope Ars uses its great website to celebrate our common interests rather than divide us by our differences as so many other forums have.

Side note: I recognize that there are many, many Christians who are equally guilty for breaking down communications with the Atheistic scientific community. I don't mean to accuse one side without acknowledging the faults of the other.

While I agree with you that many of the insults that the atheist side often throws at Christians are uncalled for and do not apply to all Christians, there still exists a huge rift in the philosophical differences between these two worldviews. Science and religion are not non-overlapping magisteria. Nor is the religious viewpoint simply another, valid way of interpreting the world. Science freely adapts itself based on new evidence and critical thought. It invites questioning and asks nothing of its adherents, other than honesty and an open mind. Religion, on the other hand, passes down revealed knowledge and expects its adherents not to question it. Rather, this knowledge must be taken completely on faith.

Now, it would be one thing if the knowledge that religion passed down and required its adherents to believe tended to be more or less true upon honest examination. In fact, if this were the case, it would lead people to believe that god(s) of said religion actually existed or, at the very least, that the religion required further inspection. The problem is, though, that the knowledge of every religion known to man has been found incredibly wanting. Religious explanations of natural phenomenon, for example, are incredibly wrong in almost every instance. And its moral teachings? Barbaric by modern standards. Sure, there might be nuggets of moral truths here and there, but, taken as a whole, ancient religious texts are replete with inequality, hate, violence, and double standards. Every piece of evidence here points to the logical conclusion that these religions, their texts, and their gods are man-made - the result of ancient peoples attempting to understand the dangerous and strange world around them and using the power of fear and ignorance to enforce societal rules.

Please understand that I am not passing judgement on these ancient peoples. In fact, I am quite grateful to them for embracing religion and tribalism. It is quite likely that these forces allowed their societies to survive in such early and barbaric times. Without religion, we may not even exist today. However, the traditional ways of thinking which allowed those early peoples to survive and even thrive pose great danger to modern society. Instead of tribalism, we need acceptance and empathy. Instead of religiously-motivated wars, we need peace and to use war as a last resort. Instead of clearly simplistic and wrong explanations of the natural world, we need real, scientific-based knowledge which can help us improve technology, cure diseases, and allow the human race to explore the natural worlds both within and without. Instead of sophistry motivated by the fear of death and manipulated by emotional pleas, we need to accept that death is a natural state that we will all eventually face and, as a natural consequence, use what time we have to make the lives of people living today as fulfilling as possible, rather than ignoring this world and its problems in exchange for a potential afterlife.

Science is not perfect. In fact, its ability to freely admit its own mistakes and adapt to new information is its greatest strength. In contrast, religion's inability to evolve and reject its provably wrong ancient texts and outmoded ways of thinking is its greatest weakness. One of these philosophies will allow mankind to improve itself and reach its full potential, while the other will keep it chained to its past mistakes and basest aspects.

Right, twice, in 4 words and a prefix. Ask a religious person for 4 words of equally potent meaning, all you get is "So sayeth the Lord", or "The end is nigh!". Ask for 5 and you get the same thing prefixed by "OMG!"

The idea that science has nothing to say about religion is an error whenever religion makes testable claims about reality.

The point is that at that time you have left the are of religion, so are no longer really talking about religion. Or shouldn’t be.

Ergo, the error is in the person(s) not in the idea.

I disagree. It may be the case that many religious believers don't think their God has a direct impact on the observable universe but that's a deist's position. Theism, on the other hand, invokes a God that answers prayer (as just one example). All three Abrahamic religions make claims about their God that are clearly within the realm of observation.

edit: Thanks for the clarification. I'm afraid I'd already written my response. Can you write to the purpose of a religion that has no observable features?

Making claims of observable events being made by their god is one thing, actually proving that is was said god doing it is something completely different.

Iwouldn't. Honestly, if it were up to me, I'd skip gun control legislation and go with gun education. Better yet, put the money to mental health; that would do more to curb gun violence than gun control, I do believe.

In my opinion it iisn't just about mental health but the common treatment often used. That common treatment being anti-depressants. In many instances where people have committed mass shootings people have been on anti-depressants or have recently stopped taking them.

The common anti-depressants, Prozac, Paxil, etc, are known to cause many people to become very hostile and suicidal during use and shortly after stopping use and yet they are still being prescribed. I have seen that first hand. Many doctors and scientists believe such a class of drugs is the equivalent of performing a chemical lobotomy and yet they are still being prescribed. They often cause even worse depression during use, and more so after stopping use, and yet they are still being prescribed. Every lawsuit against the maker of such drugs, and there have been many, have been quietly settled out of court and yet they are still being prescribed. Placebo comparison studies are just as effective and they are still being prescribed.

Some of the makers of such drugs have also been dishonest and irresponsible in disclosing the risks of using such drugs with some being banned until a warning about suicide and violence in teens was enforced, which means nothing since that somehow implies the drug knows the difference between a 17year old and an adult, which of course makes no sense.

I think you will see a dramatic decline in mental health issues, depression and violence in America once serotonin type anti-depressants are finally banned.

This is a common theory, but it ignores a few simple things. Most importantly, the reason someone is on such a anti-depressant in the first place is that they have exhibited aberrant mental behavior. Meaning they were already at risk of something going wrong. It should be no surprise when someone who commits a mass killing is later found to have been on some form of psychiatric medicine, after all what they did required some level of disturbance.

What should be truly surprising is when someone commits such an act and is found to have no history of any mental illnesses, as that is someone who fell through the cracks completely.

It's a convenient excuse, and their most favorite excuse, for the drug companies to say that the people on anti-depressants were already exhibiting "aberrant mental behavior" but there is plenty, in fact overwhelming evidence, showing the effects caused by anti-depressants. The fact that they were temporarily banned and forced to disclose suicidal and violent tendencies amongst teens is just one example. The fact that every single case brought against the makers of anti-depressants has been quietly and secretly settled is another. There are plenty more. For those who care to know the truth the evidence is not hard to find.

I have watched on more than one occasion some of the sweetest women you could ever meet turn 180 degrees into women that were extremely angry, hostile and suicidal to then turn back into, almost, the sweet women they were after they stopped taking them. Such experiences are common. Those experiences are why I did a lot of research into those drugs and why I am so much against them. I look forward to the day they are banned and some of its makers are put in prison for selling them.

I have an answer to your last remark. Today, anti-depressants are given out like candy, and for things not even related to depression. Considering the well known effects of anti-depressants and their current ease of availability and their widespread distribution it shouldn't be surprising when some who never had any mental health issues or depression all of a sudden turns violent and/or suicidal while on anti-depressants or immediately after due to their well known withdrawal effects, another thing the drug companies were forced to disclose.

I'm sorry the actual reasons for this are not to your liking, but simply handwaving them away is not something I am willing to do. People on anti-depressants are mentally unwell, hence the need for medication. You are providing a great case of why correlation != causation, however. As I said before, a rash of shootings where the shooters had no treatments in their past would concern me much more than shootings where someone has had treatment. This strongly implies that we are actually catching mental health issues, but our responses to them need improvement and followup over time.

The most motivated people tend to be kooks, whichever side of an issue. The pro-evolution people who get onto these boards tend to be evangelical atheists, which motivates the fundamentalist Christian kooks even more.

We have several documented instances (this story is just one) of the religious trying to foist their belief system on children through the public education system. Do you have a reference for your alleged atheist "kook"?

I would say the various lawsuits by atheists to remove biblical quotations from public buildings might qualify. One doesn't have to believe in God to appreciate the history involved. Why is the display of the Ten Commandments on a courthouse an unconstitutional establishment of religeon?

"Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free."

How about becaue the first four commandments have only to do with Yahweh's jealosy? And that's not even an argument regarding separation of church and state. If I'm entering a government court, should I expect to be faced with a bold presentation that the ajudicator likely believes in the laws of the god of Abraham? I say nonsense. What's so special about the Ten Commandments that grant them special favor at our courthouses?

That $39.99 copy of the latest Game of Thrones has a cost of somewhere about $18, NOT including printing costs. The publisher sells it to Amazon for that, and if Amazon is selling eboojks for $10, they're losing $8 a copy, which makes it impossible for anyone else to match that price.

That $39.99 MSRP is front-loaded for quick return on investment. Otherwise, the publisher would be losing money on every $9.99 mass market paperback - which they are not.

Agreed. This is wht the Amazon ebook issue of them selling below wholesale cost is an issue. The continue to arguwe the price is simply unreasonable for material that's free to copy infinitely, but the reality is, each copy has a royalty, a BIG one, paid to editors, authors, and others, plus marketingand more. The cost of printing and shipping is 10-15% of the common hardcover. Anohter 40% is retail overhead (so the seller can make a profit). Take 55-60% off the MSRP, that's the "cost" of the book, which includes about 10-20% profit for the publishing company itself and the rest is all royalties. That $39.99 copy of the latest Game of Thrones has a cost of somewhere about $18, NOT including printing costs. The publisher sells it to Amazon for that, and if Amazon is selling eboojks for $10, they're losing $8 a copy, which makes it impossible for anyone else to match that price. Selling it that low also undervalues print publishing, forcing stores to cut HEAVILY into their own 40% profits (much of which is operating costs) to compete. This is why so many book stores are closed and going bankrupt, and why so few ebook stores exist online. Eventually, so many book stores will be closed that amazon will have an eventual monopoly on most book sales both print and e-versions, and then they'll stop discounting them below wholesale. Publisher's fought back with the agency model, allowing them to set their own street prices individually (instead of the reseller setting them), a process that is perfectly LEGAL and used commonly in all forms of retail today, and Amazon sued them, and somehow WON?

You are basing this on a few misconceptions. First off, Amazon never sold under cost, as determined by DOJ documents Amazon's eBook business was profitable from day one. As a result they were not undercutting prices in a unsustainable way for the market.

Secondly, there was no small retailer market to speak of when Amazon became a power over the past decade. There were only two major booksellers at that point, B&B and Borders. They had acquired most of the 'independent' chains and aggressively put local book stores out of business until only used book stores survived. Amazon showed up and started finding ways to use the wholesale model to thier advantage, and were soon copied by others such as Wal*Mart which is now one of the top booksellers in the world. Ironically, as Borders and B&N have declined, local booksellers have started to show up again, as Amazon permits them to use thier selling platform as well and directly compete. They have also opened the online market for used book sellers on thier platform.

Finally, the reason the DOJ came down on publishers for the Agency model switch was that it was acquired illegally via a conspiracy that directly harmed consumers. If publishers had not illegally conspired they could have stuck with the Agency model as Random House continues to do. Illegal actions should always be prosecuted by the government as its responsibility is to its citizens, not mega corps.

The most motivated people tend to be kooks, whichever side of an issue. The pro-evolution people who get onto these boards tend to be evangelical atheists, which motivates the fundamentalist Christian kooks even more.

We have several documented instances (this story is just one) of the religious trying to foist their belief system on children through the public education system. Do you have a reference for your alleged atheist "kook"?

I would say the various lawsuits by atheists to remove biblical quotations from public buildings might qualify. One doesn't have to believe in God to appreciate the history involved. Why is the display of the Ten Commandments on a courthouse an unconstitutional establishment of religeon?

"Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free."

How about becaue the first four commandments have only to do with Yahweh's jealosy? And that's not even an argument regarding separation of church and state. If I'm entering a government court, should I expect to be faced with a bold presentation that the ajudicator likely believes in the laws of the god of Abraham? I say nonsense. What's so special about the Ten Commandments that grant them special favor at our courthouses?

And I'd like to add, if the Ten Commandments are allowed then the equivalent "rules" from every other religion should also be allowed, just think where that will end.

The most motivated people tend to be kooks, whichever side of an issue. The pro-evolution people who get onto these boards tend to be evangelical atheists, which motivates the fundamentalist Christian kooks even more.

We have several documented instances (this story is just one) of the religious trying to foist their belief system on children through the public education system. Do you have a reference for your alleged atheist "kook"?

I would say the various lawsuits by atheists to remove biblical quotations from public buildings might qualify. One doesn't have to believe in God to appreciate the history involved. Why is the display of the Ten Commandments on a courthouse an unconstitutional establishment of religeon?

"Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free."

How about becaue the first four commandments have only to do with Yahweh's jealosy? And that's not even an argument regarding separation of church and state. If I'm entering a government court, should I expect to be faced with a bold presentation that the ajudicator likely believes in the laws of the god of Abraham? I say nonsense. What's so special about the Ten Commandments that grant them special favor at our courthouses?

Going a step further, my tax dollars paid for that courthouse. I did not pay those taxes so that various religions could use that land as an advertisement or statement. If its ok to put the Ten Commandmants on display at a courthouse, why shouldn't it be ok for Coca-Cola to put up a big billboard?

Furthermore, how would someone of another religion have any faith in our system if coming in they are assaulted by religious imagry? Would a Muslim or Hindu feel they are likely to get a fair trial if the judge has a Ten Commandmants display in their courtroom, and their case is against a Christian?

I hate to have to give a disclaimer here, but I am a Christian myself. I feel, however, that my freedom to follow my faith is *strengthened* every time the ACLU wins one of these cases. After all, what else protects me from a given Christian sect or even over time perhaps a non-Christian faith from simply co-opting these agencies to enforce their own vision of faith?

Right, twice, in 4 words and a prefix. Ask a religious person for 4 words of equally potent meaning, all you get is "So sayeth the Lord", or "The end is nigh!". Ask for 5 and you get the same thing prefixed by "OMG!"

The idea that science has nothing to say about religion is an error whenever religion makes testable claims about reality.

The point is that at that time you have left the are of religion, so are no longer really talking about religion. Or shouldn’t be.

Ergo, the error is in the person(s) not in the idea.

I disagree. It may be the case that many religious believers don't think their God has a direct impact on the observable universe but that's a deist's position. Theism, on the other hand, invokes a God that answers prayer (as just one example). All three Abrahamic religions make claims about their God that are clearly within the realm of observation.

edit: Thanks for the clarification. I'm afraid I'd already written my response. Can you write to the purpose of a religion that has no observable features?

The purpose is, well, purpose. Direction. For the questions that have no observable evidence weighing in [at this point in time].

The ostensibly falsifiable claims made about G-d are NOT the key, root problem with the Abrahamic religions. The key problem is that the whole of the religions core is based around said being as the sole source of truth. This is not a requirement of a religion. A great counter-example is Buddhism. Yes, it has collected supernatural trappings over the centuries. But the core is very much centered on human self-actuated discovery and verification of “truth”. A far more compatible construct.

EDIT: To finish that thought, this means you can strip off the supernatural trappings and it still stands. What it represents is the practitioner’s choices laid out roughly as for what they are. This is commonly referred to as a personal philosophy, ( definition #8 ) but really this is what a number of Asian religions are like.

The most motivated people tend to be kooks, whichever side of an issue. The pro-evolution people who get onto these boards tend to be evangelical atheists, which motivates the fundamentalist Christian kooks even more.

We have several documented instances (this story is just one) of the religious trying to foist their belief system on children through the public education system. Do you have a reference for your alleged atheist "kook"?

I would say the various lawsuits by atheists to remove biblical quotations from public buildings might qualify. One doesn't have to believe in God to appreciate the history involved. Why is the display of the Ten Commandments on a courthouse an unconstitutional establishment of religion?

"Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free."

The answer is obvious. The display of the Ten Commandments on a courthouse is an implicit, and perhaps even explicit, acknowledgement that the courthouse finds the morals of that religion to be acceptable. Moreover, the motivation of people who wanted the Ten Commandments placed there in the first place was to raise the morals and status of its religion over that of others and influence that court's decision making - NOT, as you put it "appreciate the history involved." Furthermore, the supposed "history" you referred to never happened. The US, unlike the Confederacy, was not founded as a Christian nation, nor does the US Constitution give Christianity or any of its sects more respect than any other religion. In fact, the First Amendment goes out of its way to clearly state that the government has no authority to give any religion any preference.

To put it another way, do you think the people who want the Ten Commandments there would be fine if they were replaced with excerpts from a Hindu text? What about an Islamic text?

I would say the various lawsuits by atheists to remove biblical quotations from public buildings might qualify. One doesn't have to believe in God to appreciate the history involved. Why is the display of the Ten Commandments on a courthouse an unconstitutional establishment of religeon?

Its a government endorsement of religion.

The government cannot endorse religion.

Period. There is no "historical context".

reflex-croft wrote:

I'm sorry the actual reasons for this are not to your liking, but simply handwaving them away is not something I am willing to do. People on anti-depressants are mentally unwell, hence the need for medication. You are providing a great case of why correlation != causation, however. As I said before, a rash of shootings where the shooters had no treatments in their past would concern me much more than shootings where someone has had treatment. This strongly implies that we are actually catching mental health issues, but our responses to them need improvement and followup over time.

The problem is that anti-depressants really are a bit of a sham. They ONLY work on people with severe depression, and if you look at many studies they fail to beat the placebo effect. The truth is that the only reason we even have them is coincidence; it is not even understood why they work at all.

They probably should be pulled from the market/much more heavily restricted; they are vastly overprescribed.

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I'm not a religious person, but the late 19th/early 20th Century Eugenics movement and Nazi Germany had a similar idea.

The Nazis were never about science, and indeed their hatred of Jews was born out of both economics and religion - remember, it took until after World War II for a lot of the churches to officially come out and say that the Jews as a people were not responsible for Jesus's death.

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If they did they wouldn't have been supporting Eugenics. But hey, thanks for the Godwin attempt!

To be fair, there's nothing wrong with eugenics; the problem was that the eugenicists of the past didn't actually understand how evolution worked very well and had very wonky ideas about it, and no actual scientific evidence to back up their various theories.

Looking back, as someone who went through the TX public school system in the 1990s, I thought my middle school and high school education was pretty good. I don't remember learning any of this religiously-influenced revisionary crap. And boy am I glad I didn't. Then again, I went to "the best" school district in the Austin area (Eanes ISD). People back then didn't seem to combine religion and politics as much back then either (at least in my limited world-view).

I feel mostly the same - and I attended school in a north Dallas suburb where you were more likely to find a live dinosaur than an elected Democrat. Perhaps the phenomenon is more recent.

Seems like this is a consequence of the endless pursuit of bumper-sticker politics in America - where you need something short and flashy that essentially says I'M RIGHT, YOU'RE WRONG. SHUT UP while simultaneously offering a comprehensive answer to whatever question.

As the article alluded to, some of this is likely a consequence of these elections seing poor votoer turnout. Similar to primaries, the highly-motivated idealogues will turn out while the masses are disinterested and perhaps even turned off by the rhetoric. Increases my motivation to vote in off-year elections...

To be fair, there's nothing wrong with eugenics; the problem was that the eugenicists of the past didn't actually understand how evolution worked very well and had very wonky ideas about it, and no actual scientific evidence to back up their various theories.

We could apply eugenics today in an actually useful manner.

Did Titanium Dragon just admit that he wanted to see forced sterilization of those he finds undesirable through whatever "scientific" measures he chooses? Why yes, he did.

This whole conversation jumped the shark somewhere about 200 comments ago and is just spiraling ever further into irrationality on all sides.

To be fair, there's nothing wrong with eugenics; the problem was that the eugenicists of the past didn't actually understand how evolution worked very well and had very wonky ideas about it, and no actual scientific evidence to back up their various theories.

We could apply eugenics today in an actually useful manner.

Did Titanium Dragon just admit that he wanted to see forced sterilization of those he finds undesirable through whatever "scientific" measures he chooses? Why yes, he did.